I. Christmas in
Axeoth

NECROPOLIS

So, what does happen in the infernal
boneyard on a certain night of December? Using my powers of diplomacy
and two bottles of Rotting Cadaver Perfume, I decided to find out for
myself.

First of all, they don't have have
trees in the Necropolis. The zombies tend to sharpen their teeth on
the lower branches, and it's hard to stop the leaves wilting. Instead
they shove a pole into a Venom Spawn and drop a heavy metal star on
his head.

Venom Spawn: Ow .

Is that as painful as it looks?

Yes. Yes it is. But that's
okay, because it fills me with festive glee. I already feel warm and
fuzzy inside.

That's because you're melting.

Really? I told them not to
string up the candle ornaments! Somebody help me! Find an adhesive!

The story of Christmas in the
Necropolis is a little different to the traditional version. I found
an illustrated version of 'Christmas Stories For Boys, Girls And
Ghouls' which I found to be very enlightening.

Apparently a devil known as Satan
Claws travels from gravestone to gravestone on Christmas Eve,
dropping flaming corpses into the stockings of lucky young imps.
However, he knows if you've been bad or good - and if you've been
good, he devours you into his infernal belly for a thousand years of
unimaginable suffering.

It's really very touching.

PRESERVE

Some like to think of the Preserve as
a woodland grove where the creatures of Nature roam free and united,
protected by the spirits and dryads of the forest. I like to think of
it as a hippy commune.

All the same, Christmas is still
celebrated in the depths of the forests. I wasn't exactly welcome
inside the sacred ground, but I did get quite a good look at my
surroundings while being carried around forcibly by two gigantic
elves.

Christmas has really positive
karmic vibrations. It's, like, an eternal cycle of love and joy. See
that unicorn?

The one with the immense, lethal horn
on his head?

Yeah. We call him Rudolph the
Red-Horned Unicorn.

But his horn isn't red.

It will be when he's finished
with you, man.

I'm going to scream now.

This is what Christmas is all
about. Doesn't it bring a tear to your eye?

I performed the rest of my
investigations in a more covert style. Because cutting down trees is,
like, a total bummer, they cut down a lumberjack and decorate him
with colourful lights. Then they carefully arrange their stockings
underneath, awaiting the arrival of Santa Claus himself.

The elves in the garrisons are given
strict orders not to shoot at the sleigh, unless he appears to be
bringing in a rich land-grabbing industrialist. For Christmas gifts,
he gives out soy-bean products and meat-free sandwiches. For those
who have been bad, he puts a free pamphlet on helping the environment
into their stocking.

My research was cut short by a griffin
who insisted on mauling me in his traditional Christmas manner. It's
a good thing I can type this with just one hand.

STRONGHOLD

There is only one person who can read
in the Stronghold, and he's on a spike above the city gates. All the
same, the barbarians welcome Christmas with open arms. They put aside
time for a special Christmas celebration in the wrestling pits.

On Christmas Day, all the population
gathers in the Pits to beat each other with sticks. This is very
different to the celebration of St. Patrick's Day (where they beat
each other with stones) or Halloween (where they beat each other with
pumpkins) or even Valentine's Day (where they beat each other with
flowers).

Cyclops: Merry Christmas
! *thwack*

Ouch!

Berserker: Merry Christmas
! *thwock*

Hey!

Nomad: Merry Christmas
! *whack*

Ow!

Behemoth: Merry Christmas
! *CRUNCH*

It's a good thing I order these
Guardian Angel potions in packs of ten.

ASYLUM

After putting on a heavy rubber orc
costume (actually a Klingon costume that I stole from a Star Trek
convention, but close enough), I passed through those wooden gates to
see for myself.

It didn't take long before a shadowy
figure leapt out of an alleyway and put a sharp object up my nose.

Bandit: Give me your money!

But you can't rob me. It's Christmas
Eve.

Oh, come on. Do you think I'm
heartless, huh? You hurt me with those cruel barbs. See how I cry.
You've suggested that I'm a merciless thug who ignores the joys of
Christmas to take advantage of unwitting travellers, is that it?

Well... are you?

Of course not. I'm robbing
from the rich to give to the poor.

That's not Christmas. That's Robin
Hood.

Oh. Right. Yeah. Okay, I'm
going to take your gold and hide it in the garden so that children
may enjoy searching for it.

That's Easter.

Er, I knew that, sure. Sure.
What I meant to say, is that I'm going to take your gold, sew it into
the belly of a rabid pig, dangle him from a piano and send him
swinging through a burning window frame.

I don't even want to know what that
is. But I'm pretty sure it's not Christmas.

Just give me the damn money.

Christmas is very popular in the
Asylum. They tend to skip over the bit about presents and religion
and rich old men and decorations to get right to the part about the
fireplace. In fact, they're so taken with the fireplace idea that on
Christmas it's traditional to set fire to absolutely everything and
run around screaming.

I had my feet burned completely away
by a merry efreeti wearing a red and white turban, and a jolly black
dragon utterly incinerated my left arm. This is considered to be a
very lucky omen on Christmas Eve, as it means that Ol' Flamin' Nick
will give me a lump of charcoal for Christmas.

Until then I will have to use wooden
prosthetic limbs.

ACADEMY

The golems were busy stringing up
tinsel and elves when I entered the nearest Academy, and the dwarves
were industriously shovelling snow into gigantic snowmen which the
halflings would then decorate from afar with their slingshots. The
damage a flying carrot can do to the human body is really a lot worse
than you'd think, but I brought plenty of bandages this time.

The mages appeared to be enjoying
Christmas the most of all. I encountered one carefully writing a
letter to sent to Father Christmas himself.

Mage: ... and I've been a very
good boy this year. Love, Theodorus. There, that should do it.

What did you ask for?

Oh, nothing extravagant. I
asked him for a leather-bound copy of Dezyck's Grimoire on the
Ponderous Thaumic Creation of Essences, for a start.

Oh.

And I've always wanted an
original tome on the Essential Theoretical Decisions of the Complex
Matrix Based Inanimate Mind. With illustrations, of course.

I also wrote to him for an
original scroll of Thunderbrick's Equations for Magical Formulae in
the Production of Anti-Physical Ethereal Beings.

...

And then for a potion of
Genuine Construction Fluid, to keep the golems well-oiled, and a
limited edition copy of The Dissimenation of Magickal Dimensions in
the Limited Quadratic Folds of Space...

... must... escape...

... and then there's the
Negational Relative Physics of Unrelated Gravitational Conjuring...

... brain... going... numb...

... and the fifth page of the
Ancient Book of Irriational Productive Thought Negational Topics...

... world... so... dark...

HAVEN

It's hard to have mystical stories
about angels when real, live angels are standing right next to you
and trying to read the newspaper over your shoulder. Nevertheless,
the Haven population do their best to uphold traditional Christmas
celebrations.

Hoping not to be mugged, impaled,
burned, crushed, bored into a coma or mauled, I walked into the very
centre of the city where a crowd of peasants were gathered around a
single large Christmas tree.

Peasant: Christmas is so
commercial these days, don't you think?

Well, I guess.

I mean, take a look at me. I'm
a serf who earns on average about 6.37 gold coins a month in return
for the farming and tilling of about 87 acres of land, and the
division of taxes creates a rather uneven ratio with effort and
reward, don't you think?

Yes. I agree. I think.

You've got to put things into
perspective. If I want to celebrate Christmas, I'll do it with a
turnip. You see, peasants are the burden of the economic system when
it comes to financial matters. I'm always being pressured to provide
for the taxational relief of other less productive citizens, which
infringes my rights as an individual.

Er... so, who's up for singing a
Christmas carol?

Sorry. I can't. Union rules
forbid the overusage of oxygen without any financial bonuses or
rewards for the usage thereof. It's in the fine print, if you look
closely.

Okay. Okay. Can't we just admire the
tree, then? Have some Christmas Spirit!

You obviously have no idea how
much Christmas Spirit costs to rent these days. As for the tree, do
you realise how much gold each of those decorations costs the entire
peasant population averaged by our economic income? Do you? Tell me,
tell me this, if I was to provide the government with about twelve
percent of their potential financial bracket for the productive
distribution of complex internal gains, and if the marketsystem
wasn't crowded by the perptual cycling of the revolutionary funding
system, would YOU dare to admire this tree?

Um... yes?

You monster! Capitalist pig!
Oppressor of the people! LYNCH MOB!

It's amazing how painful pitchforks
and burning torches are. A single group of angry peasants can do more
damage than being run over by a hydra, but the local Church
resurrected me for free and even gave me a complimentary 'I Went to
The Afterlife And All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt' souveneir.

Merry Christmas!

(Gothrak is currently recovering from severe multiple injuries
caused to him by fictitious strategy game characters. His New Year's
Resolution is to be killed less often.) Back to top

II.
Hunting and Fishing with Crag

[Somewhere off the coast of
Axeoth]

Camera
moves in on Crag Hack, relaxing in a gently bobbing boat with a
fishing rod in his hands. He is smoking a leprechaun while he
attaches some bait to his hook.

CRAG: Hello,
viewers. Today we're going after the biggest catch this side of
Enroth - the Sea Monster. Now, as you loyal fans know, I'm an expert
on all things Might related. In fact, the Sea Monster is actually a
Might creature, but we couldn't build an aquarium large enough to
breed them in.

Crag stubs out his leprechaun and tosses it
overboard, then reaches into his trusty Backpack.

CRAG:
We have a real treat today. I've got the one bait that no Sea Monster
can resist. It's the perfect lure. That's right - it's a Grandmaster
Combat Hero. And this appears to be a Grade A, top class Sir
Mullich.

Crag carefully attachs the Sir Mullich lure to
his fishing rod, making it sag alarmingly.

CRAG:
All we have to do is cast and wait. Maybe, if we're lucky, we'll
catch a glimpse of the Sea Monster... or if we're really lucky, we'll
haul her aboard. And if that happens, I'll be happier than a Conflux
with a Grail, let me tell you.

Two hours of
boring fishing footage cut and replaced with the bikini section of
Miss Sprite 2002.

Sure
enough, a dark shape is rippling through the water, growing in size
as it nears the surface. The water explodes into a shower of droplets
as Crag hauls back his rod.

FERRET: Hi there,
folks! Golly!

CRAG: What are you doing here? I fired
you.

FERRET: Come on, Crag. You don't really want to
fire ol' Ferret.

CRAG: Yes. Yes I do. Didn't you get
the letter from my agent? I don't require a 'wacky
sidekick.'

FERRET: Sure you do. Shucks! What are you
doing, Crag? Can I help, huh? Can I? Can I?

CRAG:
Shouldn't you be out delivering Thunderbirds somewhere?

The
fishing rod moves in Crag's hands as something takes the bait!

CRAG: Stand back, Ferret - I think this is
it!

FERRET: Thar she blows! The great white
whale!

CRAG: Shut up!

A mighty leviathan of
the deep arches into the air and crushes down heavily onto Crag's
boat, splintering it and the occupants into several thousand
pieces.

Camera moves to Crag as he recovers in the hospital
ward. The remnants of Ferret are recovering in a jaron the bedside
table.

CRAG: Well, fans, wasn't that something.
Not only did I catch a Sea Monster, I also broke every single bone in
my body.

FERRET'S REMAINS: Give it to me straight, doc... can I
still play the violin?

CRAG: Shut up. Now join me in
watching this previously filmed footage of my expedition into the
darkest regions of the swamp tiles just on the edge of the map, in
search of the mighty Hydra.

[Somewhere in a generic
swamp]

The camera follows Crag unsteadily as he
makes his way around bubbling pools and frothing tendrils of slime.
Crag crouches onto his knees and beckons the camera-man closer.

CRAG: See this? Hydra spoor. It means we're
close.

FERRET: Ha ha! Crag's playing with
poopies!

CRAG: I hate you so much, Ferret.

Crag
points out some suspicious looking marks in the mud, and the search
continues through the overhanging fronds of the swamp canopy. Crag
raises his hand warningly.

CRAG: Now, fans,
remember that I am a trained professional.

FERRET: What
about me?

CRAG: You're just an idiot. What I'm trying
to say is that you should never, ever try to hunt down a Hydra. Call
for the professionals, like me. Because these things are nasty when
they're trapped in a corner.

Crag now carefully lifts
aside a puply mass of foliage to reveal a heavy, leathery creature
shuffling in a small pit of filthy green ooze.

CRAG:
He hasn't seen us yet. That's a good sign. It means we can sneak up
on him, quiet and slow. We don't want him to know we're
here.

FERRET: Hey, look! I can use his neck as a slide!
Wheeee!

[Ferret Mauling Censored]

Camera bounces
wildly as it follows the rapidly fleeing Crag. The sounds of heavy
pursuit can be heard admist the frantic breathing of the
camera-man.

CRAG: This... *puff* is why you
shouldn't try to hunt a Hydra without the proper equipment. Like a
ballista, or a twenty-two thousand tonne black dragon.

HYDRA:
Moo!

CRAG: Behind us we can hear the haunting cry of a
Hydra as he hunts his prey. This menacing call is also used to
attract potential mates.

HYDRA: Moo,
sailor!

CAMERA-MAN: He sounds like a cow.

CRAG:
That's what they want you to think. Nobody is mauled by a cow, are
they?

CAMERA-MAN: I had an uncle once who--

There
is a heavy crunching noise, a wet slurping and static replaces the
television image. There are five minutes of rasping silence.

The
camera returns to Crag in his hospital bed.

CRAG:
Ah, memories. I can feel the intense back pain like it was only
yesterday. When it was, in fact, only a week ago. How's the leg,
Charlie?

CAMERA-MAN: Sometimes I can feel movement in
my toes.

CRAG: Great. That's just great. Well, fans,
thanks for watching today's episode of Hunting and Fishing with Crag.
See you next week!

FERRET'S REMAINS: Don't forget to
tune into Hunting and Fishing with Ferret next week! With a guest
appearance from Crag Hack! Hahahaha!

CRAG: If my arm
wasn't in this sling I'd hurt you now, Ferret. Back to top

III. Hunting and Fishing with Crag – Special Episode

[Crag Hack's Luxury Hut,
somewhere in Axeoth]

The camera
moves through the door of Crag's luxury hut, a weird hybrid of
abandoned fishing cottage and five-star hotel. The camera moves
underneath the sagging skeleton of a great fish, through the stuffed
thorax of an elephant and into the comfortable lounge room.

CRAG: Welcome! This is a special episode of Hunting and
Fishing with Crag. We're welcoming three very special guests onto the
show, for a big hunting expedition!

Crag
gestures at the gigantic One-Way Portal in the corner of the room.

CRAG: Come on in, Sandro!

SANDRO: Good evening,
filthy mortal. Bow upon your knees and show me reverence - I have
entered your filthy domain.

Sandro drags his decaying feet
over to a giant red inflatable beanbag and clatters onto it. Some
embalming fluid begins trickling out of his eye socket, and Crag
tries hard not to notice.

CRAG: What do you think of my hut, Sandro? Nothing like a hut
to come back to and talk about your hunting and fishing
exploits.

SANDRO: I think the hut is nice, but it would
be better - if it was filled with flaming endless doom!

CRAG:
Really? I was thinking more along the lines of a jukebox.

SANDRO:
The impaled skulls of my enemies! Blood weeping from their gaping
jaws and pooling thickly around the gore-coated stakes! The power, I
tell you, the power is all mine!

CRAG: Uh... Please
welcome our second guest, Theodorus!

Theodorus staggers
through the portal, wiping clouds of thick mist off his shoulders. He
wheezes and staggers into a banana-yellow armchair.

Without
warning, the portal explodes into a cascading firework of sparks and
light, dizzying colours spiralling into the air as Jeddite cartwheels
into the hut and dazzles an impressive array of meteors into the air.

JEDDITE:
Jed-Man's in the house!

THEO: Hahaha! J-J-Jeddite's
bald!

JEDDITE: Shut up!

SANDRO: What'll
you do if we don't? Polish our scalps?

CRAG: Look!
Look! It's like a mirror!

Sandro's beanbag bursts into
flame.

JEDDITE: I said shut up!

THEO: Anyone want to go
b-b-bowling? We could use his h-h-h-head!

Sandro's glass of
champagne melts and sizzles a hole in the carpet.

JEDDITE: Shut up! Shut up!

SANDRO: You burned
right through my shoe!

CRAG: Let's hope that Heroes V
has a new artifact class - the toupee!

JEDDITE: You
work with Black Dragons and see how long your hair lasts, you stinky
barbarian! Now stop joking, or I'll punish you by making the roof
fall on Sandro's head!

CRAG: Calm down, now. We were
only having a little fun. Nobody really thinks your hair loss is
funny. In fact, we weep for you. It's tragic.

FERRET: I
liked the joke about the bowling ball!

CRAG: Shut up,
Ferret.

[In another unspecified part of Axeoth, which all
looks the same anyway]

JEDDITE: Do we really have to do this?

CRAG:
It's a Hunting and Fishing show, isn't it? This isn't the Alamar
Winfrey Show. We're not going to sit down and talk about your
childhood.

THEO: H-h-hunting is all v-very well, but
why are we h-h-hunting something so d-d-d-dangerous?

CRAG:
Because all our medical fees are payed by the sponsors.

SANDRO:
Listen to you wimps. I die once every sequel, and do you hear me
complaining? No!

The undergrowth crackles warningly. Crag
gestures for everyone to duck for cover, which in Sandro's case is
more of a slow sideways lurch, and then points at something moving in
the distance.

CRAG: Sssh. What we're hearing now is the migrational
rustlings of the rare but harmless Woodland Vampire.

VAMPIRE:
Blah!

CRAG: If we're quiet, we will see him flapping
from tree to tree, returning to his nest where he will feed his
little vampire hatchlings. We don't want to disturb him now, so stay
quiet.

SANDRO: Is your little friend meant to be doing
that?

CRAG: You mean Ferret, who seems to be running
around with a gigantic lobster clamped to his head?

SANDRO:
Yes.

CRAG: It's okay. He's insured.

VAMPIRE
(distantly): Blah!

Crag rises to his feet and
scrapes mud off his knees. Without a word he leads the small troupe
through the forest, ducking underneath branches and stepping over
gaping chasms filled with lava, an unfortunate geographical obstacle
in maps designed by people who take far too much pleasure in using
the Inferno brushes.

CRAG: Now, if you look closely, you'll see that the imprints
in this mud are formed into oddly concentric circles.

JEDDITE:
What does it mean?

CRAG: It means that a dwarf has
passed by recently. As everyone knows, dwarves are fond of concentric
circles.

THEO: You m-made that up.

CRAG:
Er, let's continue tracking our prey. Judging by the direction the
wind is blowing and the light I can see reflecting off the pool
seventeen metres through the foliage to my left, I believe we are
precisly sixteen seconds away from encoutering our quarry.

FERRET:
Golly. You sure are smart, Crag – for a stupid
dumb-head!

SANDRO: If I get to use Necromancy on Ferret
at the end of this, I may consider the day to have been a
success.

JEDDITE: Uh-oh.

With a whirring of
giant wings, a huge Mantis clicks through the air and slashes its
mandibles into the ground. Little chitinous rasps vibrate down its
side as the carapace settles.

CRAG: Actually, that should have been fourteen seconds. Okay!
Ferret! Hand me the Mantis Catching Net!

FERRET: You
mean the one that I tore into small pieces and planted in the ground,
hoping they'd grow into beautiful apple trees?

CRAG: At
times like this I'm glad that I book my doctor's appointments in
advance.

JEDDITE: Just step back and let me take care
of it with my awesome plethora of magical powers.

Jeddite
creates a Meteor Shower and deftly aims it at the mantis. The flaming
chunks of rock that should have obliterated everything in a mile
radius somehow passes through the mantis without visible effect.

JEDDITE: Damn... they took out Meteor Shower in Heroes IV!
Aauuugh!

[Jeddite Mauling Censored]

JEDDITE'S REMAINS: Well, that was annoying.

SANDRO:
Amateur. Let the necromancer show you how it's done.

Sandro
conjures a dark hand that waves across the Mantis' soul, attempting
to banish it to dark eternity in Oblivion. The mantis doesn't seem
particularly impressed.

SANDRO: That was supposed to kill eight units. What went
wrong?

With lightning speed the Mantis strikes, but Sandro
is too quick -- well, he decomposed slightly on his left side and the
attack missed, but assuming that he dodged it is so much simpler.

SANDRO: I'll get you now! I'm going to use Jeddite's corpse to
summon an army of skeletons!

JEDDITE'S REMAINS: Hey!
You need a permit for that!

SANDRO: I don't get it! No
matter what spells I use, they just keep failing! It should be
suffering anguish unknown to any living being!

FERRET:
Hey, Crag. We're all out of this Mantis Spray because I just sprayed
it all over that gigantic killer mantis.

CRAG: That's
not Mantis Spray. That's Death Ward Spray.

FERRET: Oh.
Hey, look! Sandro just got eaten!

SANDRO'S REMAINS: Not
again! Do you know how much I pay in funeral fees?

CRAG: Okay, viewers. As you may be able to see, we're
currently filming footage of a man being chased by a mantis. Take
note of how the mantis uses its powerful forelegs to propel itself,
and how it can glide gently with its wings. Watch as it nears its
prey and begans to slide open its mandibles in anticipation of the
meal. See closely as its eyes home in on its meal, and watch
carefully as it begans to lift the food into its mouth and–

IV. Hunting and Fishing with Crag – Telegrams

(starring
DR as Sir Mullich's remains)

To: "Hunting and Fishing with Crag"
producer

Dear Mr. Producer

After the recent
events and disclosures about the "Hunting and Fishing with Crag"
show, I believe you are looking for a new character. I guess you are
not very happy at the fact that your so-called superstar doesn't have
the courage to face danger himself. What could you expect from a
barbarian after all? They have never even heard of anything like
nobility. I can offer you that, and much more... I'm sure you will
find my application most suitable for this responsible position.

Respectfully yours,Sir Mullich's remains

To: Sir Mullich (deceased)

Dear Sir Mullich,

We understand that Crag Hack
cannot attend a civilised social gathering without beheading the
waiter and trying to loot and pillage the dessert. We also realise
that in each of the last 98 episodes of 'Hunting and Fishing with
Crag', he has broken 763 bones, 17 vital organs, and 674,546 cameras.

However, Mr. Hack has a very solid fan base. We get many
mails daily from those who wish to inform us that Mr. Hack is both a
dude and utterly grouse to the max. We also believe that he is
extremely rad. Some would go so far as to claim that he is a hip
daddy.

In addition, Mr. Hack is currently holding a very large
axe to my neck and threatening me with decapitation. We believe quite
firmly that under the circumstances we must deny your
application.

Mr. Sebastian SolmyrProducer of 'Hunting and
Fishing With Crag'

To:
Mr. Sebastian Solmyr, Producer of "Fishing and Hunting with
Crag"

Yes,
I should have known that a producer who keeps this barbarian bastard
for that long would never understand. Is there anyone left in this
world who respects the values of honesty, bravery, loyalty? Is
everybody going to betray his own principles simply because a freak
is holding an axe next to his head? Is everybody going to let those
hedious giants do their evil deeds just because others think they are
windmills?

Regretfully yours,Sir Mullich (still existing
somewhere)

To: The Afterlife

Dear Sir Mullich,

We
are fortunate enough to have discovered a vacancy for one with your
acting talents. We currently need a prop in Scene 67, where Crag
attempts to tame a rabid Nightmare with nothing but a spoon. We
believe your cadaver has the exact contours required for the scenic
background.

Sincerely,Mr. Sebastion Solmyr, 'Hunting and
Fishing With Crag' Back to top

V. Bad, Bad
Multiplayer Tips

Using these horrible, horrible tricks in a
hotseat game will land you in the front page story of your local
newspaper. Expect another four pages of your friends saying 'He/she
was such a nice person... and the two were great friends. I can't
believe he/she would force them into a paper shredder and press the
ON button.'

However, anyone who is two tectonic plates away
from you is fair game for these insidious tips. They are guaranteed
to make your online opponent really, really hate you. I mean
'stalking you down and eating you' hate, not just 'constant abuse
over the game chat' hate, although you'll get plenty of that
too.

Minotaur Madness

Don't you hate
it when a minotaur reflects all your attacks? Doesn't it fill you
with insane rage, causing you to attack your keyboard or monitor?

Of
course it does. That's why you make an army composed entirely of
eight minotaur stacks.

Continually attack them with minotaur armies, who will take half
an hour to kill because of their constant reflection. By the end of
the sixth minotaur wave your enemy's brain will have dissolved. Kill
them while they babble and chew on their mousepad.

You
Are Feeling Very Sleepy

When facing an opponent with
only a single creature stack, Hypnotize that creature. Walk it back
to the enemy's side of the combat field. Wait three turns, hypnotize
the creature, walk it back again.

Keep doing this for roughly
seven hours.

Surprise!

Get a hero with
Grandmaster Stealth and sneak into your friend (soon to be enemy)'s
lands. Run up to one of his mines and flag it. Then type the
following message:

!!!! SURPRISE !!!!!

Run away
giggling. When he moves a hero over to reflag the mine, flag another
one. Once again, type !!!! SURPRISE !!!!

Repeat this until you
begin to feel bad and guilty.Or until he reaches through the monitor
and strangles you.

By the way, you can also use this to steal
all the artifacts, resources and chests still on the game map. Have
fun. Enjoy the final few days you have left until they find out where
you live.

The Siege Never Ends

Your
enemy is trapped inside his fortress, with only the pitiful rabble
he's scrapped out of his garrison to meet your armada of elite and
deadly troops.

Hit wait.

Hit wait.

Hit wait.

By
now he's probably moving his peasants around, waiting for your black
dragons to fly over the walls. Don't fall for it. The key is to
wait.

Keep waiting. He could be planning something. You'll
never know unless you hit the Wait button.

By the time he
takes out his troops through that drawbridge in a suicidal attack to
end this stupid, stupid siege, you will probably have grown a
metre-long beard. Even if you're female.

Wild Harpy
Chase

He hasn't got any ranged attackers? How about
magic casters? Really? Good.

Try to find out how long it takes
an army to catch a single harpy that's flying madly around the
screen. Be sure to have your food and water being fed in through an
intravenous drip. Your enemy won't have that advantage, and so the
victory will be all yours.

They Can't Count the
Counts

Play as Death Magic and use Grandmaster
Necromancy.

I'm Confused

When you
crush your enemy's army except for one final stack of units, cast
Confusion on it until you run out of mana.

This is best done
after visiting a Mana Vortex and with the Supreme Crown of the
Magi.

The Queue

Hire two months worth
of level One units, and then send them into enemy territory one at a
time. Try to break the game by having the most armies you possibly
can, all consisting of One Squire! Attack your enemy's castle over
and over with a force of One Wolf! Squeal with delight as you
continually harass Solymr, the Level 48 Archmage, with an armada of
One Imps!

Lost at Sea

Gather up as
much gold and wood as you can, find a shipyard, and build boats.
Don't stop. Just make boats. Fill the shores with boats. Cover every
inch of the continent's edge with boats. You mustn't stop. The voices
want you to build boats.

Now hide in one and watch as your
enemy painstakingly examines each of them for a little waving
flag.

Ceaseless Caravan

When you take
over a minor city belonging to your opponent, make a Caravan list as
long as you possibly can consisting of single level One units, much
like The Queue.

Then let them take the city back. They'll be
having to kill level one troops outside their city for months. This
is your opportunity to harass them with the Queue and make their
frontal lobe implode.

Artifact Avarice

Whenever
you get an artifact, be sure to tell your opponent all about it. And
mention how great it is. And how pleased you are that you got the
artifact. Remind them what slot it goes in, and what stats it does,
and how pretty the icon is. Tell them all about how you looted it
from behind that stack of crusaders. Let them know how nice it looks
around your hero's neck.

Self-Loathing

Discover
the true name of your opponent (unless it really is
crazyLoveMachine67) and give that name to all your heroes. See their
reaction when they're forced to beat themselves to win the game.
Enjoy the psychological trauma you've inflicted.

And then,
once you've lost, point out that they were actually defeated,
captured and locked away in an enemy prison. Several times.

The Sneaky

The trick is to never buy your
units. Sit and wait, watching that tiny pixel on the Thieves' Guild
which is your Kingdom Army Strength. Wait for the gloating enemy to
move towards your castle, towing along his little friends.

Then,
on the turn that he's about to attack, suddenly buy five months worth
of creatures.

Imp Frenzy

Isn't it
great how imps drain mana? Be sure to build entire imp armies and
attack a caster hero with the sole intent of draining out his mana
before the fight begins. Then attack with your real forces, and laugh
each time he tries to cast Fireball.

I Hate To Say It,
But...

KNIGhtMARE: d00d I k1ck3d yur buttKNIGhtMARE:
what is wrong with u i had 43 angels and u only had 6
titansKNIGhtMARE: u must really suck i mean my hero was like 20
levels higher and i did not even lose a single squire in ourlast
fightKNIGhtMARE: rofl i can't believe how much u suckYOU:
WellYOU: I hate to say it, butYOU: I let you winKNIGhtMARE:
like hell u didYOU: No, reallyYOU: My Buddhist guru told me
to reward somebody today and to help them feel specialYOU: That
person was you, KNIGhtMAREYOU: I did it for my faithYOU: I
really hope it boosted your self esteemKNIGhtMARE: i hate
u

VI.
Hope for the Mythologically Impaired

Mythology is a wonderful thing. It gives us an ancient primal
knowledge of something we'd never understand otherwise, and it also
allows us to make quality fantasy-based strategy games. Many of the
creatures in Heroes of Might and Magic come from a rich and diverse
background, legendary beasts of different cultures throughout the
wide span of Time.

The question is, what about those odd exceptions? Well, I, the
Scholarly Gothrak, have delved deep into various dusty tomes and
grimoires in the search for the Past. It was the imploring pleas of
the creatures that sent me on this odyssey, my quest inspired by the
little tears that rolled down their un-fabled cheeks.

Let us begin with that most venerable, beloved of creatures; the
Venom Spawn.

Like the gryphon and the water buffalo, the Venom Spawn harkens
back to the time of the Egyptians. The ancient pharaohs revered it is
a holy beast, the one they called 'Jelly-Ra', the carrier of souls
between the Afterlife and the Land of Lime.

Often found growing beneath the bellies of the royal crocodiles,
the Venom Spawns were usually harvested from the banks of the Nile
and smeared on primitive Egyptian bread. However, the Spawn was
reluctant to be consumed, and was feared for its incredible ability
to spit 16-24 damage.

My
delvings into the history of this exotic creature proved fruitful
after I discovered a missing paragraph of the Dead Sea Scrolls, just
after the missing legal advice that claimed any copies of the
original documented would be punished by having the copier's soul
devoured by the holy beast serving Set, much like the publisher's
warnings of today.

It went as thus: The wise men often speak of the fabled creatures
that hold the key to immortality, such as the jackal and the flying
wildebeest. Yet none inspires such fervour in the high priests as the
one known as Jelly-Ra, greatest of slimy composites. We began
searching for them an entire moon ago and our search has given no
rewards, but it is near their breeding season and we must get
fortunate soon. Must stop writing now; the cook has found some
delicious gelatin and we're going to eat it. Will write again in the
morning

Tragically, the note ended with a strange smear of blood and
slime. A mystery to baffle all scholars for eons to come.

Yet another creature approached me imploring me to find it a past
it could be proud of. The Ice Demon pointed out that, in
theory, it couldn't have come from the Burning Flames of Hell because
of its unhappy tendancy to melt when exposed to heat.

This
was truly a puzzle. Where could an infernal creature develop without
being scorched by the never-resting tongues of the Abyss of Flame? It
was many long days of research before I discovered that they were the
foul spawn of Satan Claus, who lived in an arctic wasteland known as
the North Pole.

The ice demons are today named 'elves', and due to a severe case
of dyslexia their evil creator is known as Santa Claus or, in extreme
cases, Father Christmas. They serve their dark masters by creating
toys to amuse small children, knowing all the while that the little
plastic bit that holds it together is going to break, and none of
Daddy's super adhesive glue will put it back together again, bringing
pure misery to the hearts of all across the globe.

They also create the instructions for putting together model
airplanes and bicycles, their fiendish ingenuity truly an example to
all demonkind. Every time a child screams 'Mummy, my new twuck wheels
came off!', an ice demon is listening and gloating.

Next to come begging for my wisdom was the Waspwort,
devastated by its lack of mythological background. Inspired by pure
chance, I slowly discovered that the waspwort evolved from an
intelligent breed of plastic sunglasses, such as those worn by trendy
Sumarians and Mesopotamians.

It took many years of demented evolution for them to reach their
current state, but they are thought to have once reached the form of
a terrible weed, a poisonous scourge to mankind, a vicious,
monstrous, vile beast to taint the throats and boil the tongue of any
that came near.

Yes, the waspwort was once a brussel sprout. Filled with insane
glee by their horrible, monstrous background, I could only smile as
the joyous waspwort slowly dragged itself into the dawn of a new day.

My final visitor was a surprise, for it was none other than a
devil. I tried to explain that the mythological background of
devils were solid indeed, but it would not hear my protests,
explaining its woes with a single sentence:

"But why do I have a toasting fork for a hand?"

This was a good question. Where did the devil suddenly sprout a
fork as a hand, and what were the mythological precedents? Where did
this black transformation occur? I set to work.

It
didn't take long for me to recover a story lost to history, the Reign
of the Wrathful Marshmallow. This marshmallow had long endured
roasting at the end of a sharp stick, slowly building up spite and
even hatred for its human oppressors. One day, forced to the limits
of its patience, the Marshmallow snapped. It called upon the dark
forces of the world to rise, to come to its aid, and to impale then
lightly roast its human captors over a jolly campfire preferably
while telling hilarious woodland stories.

Many a man was tormented to his death in this cruel fashion, all
the time hearing the story about the bear and the little boy who had
to leave the tent to go to the toilet. Worst of all were those men
who died to the chorus of 'Kumbaya', and even now I wince at the
retelling. Those were tragic times, and it was only after a succesful
rebellion that the shackles of Marshmallow were thrown aside and the
toasting-fork demons sent back to the Hells, waiting for their chance
to appear in the Heroes III sequel.

Unfortunately, the devil didn't believe me and proceeded to flay
me slowly to death over a cauldron of burning magma. Which means that
I'll have to stop writing this now, as my hand is going numb, and I'm
not sure I can still feel my lungs.